


Forget a Symphony

by artemisgrace



Series: Hannibal Rambling [2]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Falling In Love, Hannibal is pretentious, I'm calling it "teen and up" cuz the show itself is not for kids, Internal Monologue, Love Confessions, M/M, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Unhealthy Relationships, even in humility, references to violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-07
Updated: 2017-09-07
Packaged: 2018-12-24 23:13:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12023064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artemisgrace/pseuds/artemisgrace
Summary: Hannibal's internal monologue, waxing poetic about his favorite subject: Will Graham. Takes place immediately after a kill.(This is my first Hannibal fic ever, please be kind)





	Forget a Symphony

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote the vast majority of this a while ago at about 3 a.m. and had forgotten about it until only recently. It's not really connected to any particular larger plot so I thought I'd post it just as a one-shot.

Forget a symphony, Hannibal thinks as he looks in wonder upon the bloodstained face smiling, shining down upon him. Forget an opera. Der Ring des Nibelungen itself, the epic feat of musical artistry, in all its grand four days of operatic glory, could not even hold a candle next to the miracle that is Will Graham. He is a symphony in himself, and their tale together an oeuvre d’art most unforgettable.

A few years ago, a century, a millennium ago it seems to Hannibal’s mind, he had heard only silence when he looked at Will Graham. It had never been the silence of disinterest, no, Hannibal had known the potential that lay therein the first time he’d looked into the other man’s head, crawled around the interior of his skull. He had known there was something remarkable there, some unique artifact to be collected, examined, and toyed with, but he had taken so long, so very long, to recognize just how significant Will was, that his potential was more than Hannibal could have ever conceived of. 

The silence that stemmed from uncertainty faded quickly into a different sort of quiet, into the heavy, thick silence of a chess match between two grand masters, the stakes too high and the game too riveting to be sullied by something so mundane as speech. Each movement so slow and precise, even as they each in turn stumbled and fell. 

They were a series of wonderful paradoxes. 

Then the silent steps of their quiet game gradually transformed, and Hannibal began to hear music in the halls of his imagination whenever he and Will came into contact, every word, every deception, every loving little lie a note in a musical score too complex to be played by any but the most skilled pianist. Were Hannibal to try to bring the song to life in the real world, outside of his reveries, even he, in his considerable acquired skill, could never hope to do it justice. 

Somewhere between there and here, the steps became a dance, a bloody, violent waltz that spun them around each other, and even as the dance brought space between them, their hands always remained joined, drawing them back together time and time again. Inseparable, for good or ill. 

“May the Lord make his face to shine upon me”

The thought springs unbidden to Hannibal’s mind and he lets out a mocking chuckle. No, he has no use of the blessing of an absentee deity. No. His eyes were never turned toward the heavens. He believes in no heaven but the one in which he currently finds himself.

May Will Graham make his face to shine upon me, Hannibal chants silently, as Will bows over him, suddenly bottomless eyes staring into Hannibal’s own, seeing him as no other ever had, nor ever could. He closes his eyes in reverence and feels the crimson drip from Will’s blood-soaked curls down onto Hannibal’s own upturned face. It’s somewhat reminiscent of a baptism, he thinks, and he breathes in deeply, inhaling the metallic tang of death that lay over the scent of Will Graham’s abhorrent, yet oddly endearing, aftershave and cheap laundry detergent. It’s perfect. 

If Hannibal could bottle this moment like a fine wine, he would happily drink of it, and nothing else, for the rest of his life. 

It is then that Hannibal feels two hands, slippery with blood, none of it their own, move to take his face between them, cradling his head in hands that have such a marvelous capacity for violence, but that handle him so gently in this moment that he can almost imagine it to be a dream. He opens his eyes at the bidding of those hands, and words are in no way required to voice the thoughts that pass through either of their heads, no, the meeting of eyes says enough. Words never meant much, they could so easily be falsified, as they both had done time and time again, but the truth had always come out between them in their expressions. The guilt, the conflict, the remorse, the deep, soul-destroying affection, they were always to be seen, if not said. 

Everything so profoundly felt.

Hannibal is entranced as he feels the lips of Will Graham press a soft kiss to his forehead. It is a blessing; he could describe it as nothing else.

Hannibal had never put much stock in the notion of acceptance. Why desire the approval of people whose opinions fundamentally do not matter? He had never cared to be accepted, couldn’t even fathom what drove reasonable people to seek such a thing, that is, until Will Graham had first rejected him. 

Not that he’d really had to try before Will. It had always come so easy, wrapping people around his finger, and perhaps that was why Will was so important. He was the very first real challenge. An exquisite pain.

It had stung, the feeling of salt in a wound that Hannibal wouldn’t have believed could made, not by even the sharpest of another’s disdainful looks. Will pushing him away had cut deep, so deep, to the bone, to the core. It was the first time he’d ever wanted to be accepted, the first time he’d ever craved such a thing, and it had been denied to him.

It’s been such a long, long road to get to the place at which he kneels now. 

Reverent, at Will Graham’s feet.

The kiss is the only acceptance Hannibal has ever cared for, the closest he’s ever come to devotion, to faith. Will is the only person he would ever kneel for, the only person who could deserve it, and it has been proven through years of blood, harsh words, and tears. The kiss is a balm, soothing to the wound. It wipes their slate clean, though the best of scars will forever remain. 

It is as much a revelation as anything has ever been.


End file.
